Untitled (Death as Deterrence)

Abstract

Untitled (Death as Deterrence) is a multimedia art installation that explores the ideological origins, euphemistic language, and material consequences of Border Patrol Strategic Plan 1994 & Beyond, a border militarization policy founded upon the theory of “prevention through deterrence”. Instead of addressing the social, economic, and political root causes of migration, this plan weaponized the hostile desert terrain in order to prevent would-be migrants from crossing, thus creating a violent crisis of death and disappearance that continues today. Untitled (Death as Deterrence) acknowledges the dead and the missing by framing the predatory policies responsible for their disappearance. This installation incorporates materials from the desert itself as evidence, allowing the Sonoran desert to leave its locale and intimately trouble those comfortably distanced from this deadly terrain. My work is an elegy for the migrants who are forced north; it does not intend to memorialize them, but rather to serve as a material reminder of our collective responsibility for their deaths and disappearances.